Author: ALJAZEERA

The Israeli military’s reported use of an untested and undisclosed artificial intelligence-powered database to identify targets for its bombing campaign in Gaza has alarmed human rights and technology experts who said it could amount to “war crimes”. The Israeli-Palestinian publication +972 Magazine and Hebrew-language media outlet Local Call reported recently that the Israeli army was isolating and identifying thousands of Palestinians as potential bombing targets using an AI-assisted targeting system called Lavender. “That database is responsible for drawing up kill lists of as many as 37,000 targets,” Al Jazeera’s Rory Challands, reporting from occupied East Jerusalem, said on Thursday. The…

Yoon pledges not to back down on plans to increase medical school admissions.South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has pledged not to back down on plans to increase medical school admissions as he accused striking doctors of operating as a “cartel”. In an address to the nation on Monday, Yoon said the planned addition of 2,000 medical school places was the minimum needed. “The number 2,000 is not a random figure we came up with. We have thoroughly reviewed relevant statistics and research and reviewed present and future medical situations,” Yoon said, adding that the government’s reforms aimed to create “a…

Israeli fighter jets fired missiles at the Iranian embassy in Syria’s capital Damascus earlier this week, killing senior military commanders. Tehran has said it will retaliate, with experts saying it has options at its disposal with wide-ranging ramifications. But why does Israel keep launching air strikes on Syria and what will happen next? When did the attacks start? The Israeli military has been regularly assaulting Syria for more than a decade, taking advantage of the country’s chaos following its civil war that started in 2011. The war has largely ended, and years of Iranian and Russian support for the rule…

Keerthi Subramanian, a shop clerk in South London, earns 10.42 pounds ($13.15) an hour. From Monday that will go up by 1.02 pounds ($1.29) to 11.44 pounds ($14.44) as a new United Kingdom minimum wage kicks in. That is not much help, she says. “At just over 10 pounds, I wasn’t earning enough. Everything from energy to food prices and rent have gone up in recent years,” Subramanian told Al Jazeera. While the new legal minimum wage, also known as the National Living Wage (NLW), represents a 9.8 percent increase from previous levels  – the highest single boost since 2001…

Israel’s parliament passed a law on Monday that allows temporary shutdowns of foreign media in Israel including — and perhaps principally — Al Jazeera. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said several times he intends to shutter Al Jazeera in Israel. The law allows for the closure of foreign media bureaus for up to 45 days, a renewable period, and would stay in effect until the end of July or until major military operations in Gaza conclude. It also allows for the confiscation of their equipment if it is believed they pose “harm to the state’s security”. “Al Jazeera harmed…

The company debuted on the stock market last week, offering Trump a ray of hope amid pending financial woes.Shares in former President Donald Trump’s Trump Media & Technology Group surged last week after debuting on the stock market in the United States. But a disclosure that the company lost nearly $58.2m in 2023 has sent those stocks tumbling, dropping by 23 percent as of Monday. The volatile first week, which came in the wake of a merger with the shell company Digital World Acquisition Corp, underscored the unpredictability of a venture that the former president may be relying on for…

Human Rights Watch says 54 children among dead in ‘unlawful’ attack on residential building on October 31.An “unlawful” Israeli air attack that killed 106 people in a residential building in central Gaza on October 31, 2023, was an “apparent war crime”, Human Rights Watch (HRW) has said. The inquiry was based on testimonies from 16 people the group spoke to between January and March, satellite images, dozens of photographs and videos from the site, as well as those shared on social media, the international rights group said on Thursday as it released the findings of its investigation. It called on…

The Black Death – the pandemic of bubonic plague which swept Europe and Asia for about five years in the mid-1300s – is widely believed to have reduced the global population by one-third. But almost 700 years after this infamous pandemic became the last worldwide phenomenon to reduce global population levels by such a huge amount, a new report has warned of the “staggering social change” posed by plummeting fertility rates which could also see the number of humans on our planet, currently standing at more than eight billion, fall within decades. According to a recent global fertility study published…

It has been almost six months since Israel launched its most recent onslaught on Gaza, which has now reached genocidal proportions. The Israeli army has killed more than 33,000 Palestinians, injured more than 75,000 and obliterated civilian buildings and infrastructure across the strip. Israel is currently in violation of the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) provisional measures requesting the protection of Palestinian rights, and the UN Security Council’s resolution calling for a ceasefire. Its atrocities in Gaza are part and parcel of its settler colonialism which infringes on the most basic international legal principles and is a threat to international…

Ronaldo leads the Saudi league’s goal-scoring chart with 29 goals, but Al Nassr trail Al Hilal by 12 points.Cristiano Ronaldo notched his second hat-trick in the space of 72 hours as Al Nassr routed Abha 8-0 in the Saudi Pro League. The five-time Ballon d’Or winner scored three goals and recorded two assists in the first half for the nine-time Saudi Arabian champions on Tuesday. The hat-trick was his third of the league season following his treble in Saturday’s 5-1 win over Al Tai. The Portugal forward leads the league with 29 goals. Ronaldo’s first two goals on Tuesday came…